This Green and Surprising Pleasant Land : Current Affairs

A banking disgrace that put’s the Farage Coutts trauma into perspective

A palpable sigh of relief has pulsated through the British nation now that Coutts Bank has decided  to unclose Nigel Farage’s bank account. Yet hardly any attention has been paid to a rather more substantial bank scandal involving HSBC, Britain’s biggest bank.

But first and reluctantly, let’s recap on this affront to an upstanding citizen which must be grave of national importance because why else would no lesser or smaller person than the Prime Minister have got involved?

Obviously, when considering the customer base of a posh bank there is the problem that Mr Farage only attended a relatively minor public school, Dulwich College, even though it is one of the most expensive in the land. It is not known whether this explains why he quit the Conservative Party to wander off into politics that were extremist before the Tories made extremism the norm.

However Coutts clearly had no qualms in taking on a younger Nigel. But then it had second thoughts and decided that his toxic politics might reflect poorly on the Coutts brand and asked him to go to the more mundane Nat West part of its operation.

Even though I cannot bring to mind anything I like about Mr Farage, I sort of agree that this was a bit much and the bank has apologised and heads have rolled. Just because he is xenophobic, racist and an insatiable political opportunist, his banking arrangements, it is now widely agreed, should not have been affected. Mind you, it is somewhat puzzling why this self-proclaimed Man of the People was so upset by the idea of having to stand in line with the hoi polloi at his local Nat West branch.

There are clearly questions to be answered here but they fade into the background compared with the questions not being asked about the politically motivated behaviour of HSBC.

HSBC does not flaunt its full name in Britain presumably because what is proudly known as the Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation in Asia, sounds ever so slightly foreign to the punters on the East Cheam high street.

However while the bank has always been British owned and controlled it makes the overwhelming bulk of its profits in the East, where it has a long history following the Union flag.

In Hong Kong, its previous base, it is simply and arrogantly known as The Bank because of its prominence.

What is not so well known here in Britain is that HSBC has played a prominent role in disrupting the lives of customers who have been deemed to be enemies of the state by the Communist regime as it tightens the screws on the people of Hong Kong.

The bank was quick to express fulsome support for the regime when a draconian National Security Law was imposed by Beijing in Hong Kong in 2020. Full page newspaper advertisements were rushed out with HSBC saying how wonderful the law was.

That’s quite bad enough but the bank has also been in the forefront of targeting the regime’s opponents by both freezing and closing their accounts. It (alongside other banks) is also refusing to release pension funds to British residents who have left Hong Kong under the British National Overseas scheme that gives refuge to Hongkongers fleeing the growing repression in the former British colony. This scheme confirms is much hated by the apparatchiks because the exodus is a potent reminder of how little they are trusted.

It’s not as if the bank only started eating vast platters of Peking Duck following the introduction of the blunderbuss security law which outlaws all opposition. Back in 2016, well before the law came into force, HSBC refused to open an account for a new political party led by the now jailed Joshua Wong, one of the best known protest movement leaders. In that marvellous tradition of weasel  behaviour, so beloved by banks, it cited administrative and business reasons for its decision.

Noel Quinn, HSBC’s Chief Weasel also Chief Executive, told the UK Parliamentary Foreign Affairs Committee in January 2021 that the bank was only following orders, an excuse which, if I am not mistaken, has been used before. He said that to do anything other than follow orders would be ‘a criminal offence’.

To be fair HSBC would be in the deepest of do-do if it did not follow orders in Hong Kong. Whether it needs to do so with such zeal and enthusiasm and without even questioning the impact on its customers, is another question.

So, the bank is clearly under pressure in Hong Kong and bleats about being squeezed between two sets of pressure, here in Britain and there in Hong Kong. However the reality is that it faces no pressure from Britain. The UK government, which regulates the bank, has nothing to say about this.

Yet, having chosen to sup with the devil why should HSBC only face consequences from the devil’s side? Why can the UK government not even bring itself to draw attention to what’s happening? Secondly, why does the government continue to indulge the bank by giving it official business?

It would appear that the affairs of Mr Farage are of much greater national importance, compared with those of a state that many security experts have described as posing the greatest threat to Britain’s national security.

So, HSBC can close accounts for political reasons as long as they do so abroad in cooperation with the world’s largest dictatorship. That seems measured and reasonable to me. There is no sign of heads rolling over at HSBC or of hapless Hong Kong residents in Britain being given access to their pension funds.

I promise not to mention Mr Farage in next week’s dispatch and maybe never again as I’m trying to maintain some standards here.